this post was submitted on 08 Sep 2023
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Nice.
Your argument parallels the no true Scotsman fallacy much closer than you realize.
You: no Scotsman would commit such a crime
Me: but it says here that a Scotsman committed the crime
You: No true Scotsman would commit such a crime...
Compare:
You: buses are great!
Me: I take buses and they suck!
You: good buses are great, you just aren't taking the good ones...
It's exactly the same. You get to decide who is a true Scotsman for the purpose of argument, and what constitutes a good bus service. You can simply declare that the bus service isn't a good one and therefore doesn't reflect badly on bus services, just as you can decide the criminal wasn't a true Scotsman, and therefore you're always right.
I have used buses which run frequently for buses, but which are still too infrequent and thus add lots of unnecessary time.
I think NYC is an excellent representative of transit done well. It may not be world-best, but there aren't many places that are as dense or more dense and that creates a best case scenario for running at all hours and with maximum frequency. Also, most people don't own cars and don't drive there. There are few places with so many built-in advantages for transit as NYC.
No argument there.
I think you need to read up on what that phallacy is before tossing it around: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_true_Scotsman
It applies to generalized statements, which I never made. You even had to falsely paraphrase my statement to make it more applicable (that phallacy is called a straw man by the way). But I never said all buses are great. In fact I think you’re right that most buses in the US are terrible. I’m just saying that they don’t have to. It’s a totally different type of claim. If anything your argument is more logically similar because you are making a universal claim that buses are always bad.
Part of the issue is that we probably don’t have a common definition of a good or bad mode of transit. I would say cars are a terrible way to get around in most urban areas, but you obviously don’t agree because we have different definitions of what makes something a good or bad way to get around.
But I will maintain that bus systems, when properly managed and implemented would be preferable over driving for that majority of people in urban areas, and even in some rural or small towns too.
I read the link I posted, which is the same one you linked. I think some of the way you presented your argument suggests to me that you're making a distinction between well-executed and poorly-executed transit, and saying that because I find transit/buses to be inefficient and an unbearable mode of travel, I must be using a poorly-executed system. That sounds a lot to me like no-true-scotsman, because you seem to be judging whether I'm experiencing the "real thing" based on whether I thought it was efficient or not. Clearly I must be experiencing a bad version of it if it was inefficient or otherwise not to my liking - or at least that's what you seem to have implied.
I agree that we probably don't have a common definition of good or bad transit.
I also think you should read up on what a phallus is.